THE THELEPHORACEiE OF NORTH AMERICA. I^ 



EDWARD ANGUS BURT 



Mycologist and Librarian to the Missouri Botanical Garden 



Associate Professor in the Henry Shaic School of Botany of 



Washington University 



Introduction 



This monographic study of the North American ThelepJioracece 

 was begun in 1894 as the author's contribution towards a greatly 

 needed manual of the Basidiomycetes of the United States, — a 

 need that still confronts us. It has been necessary to carry on 

 these investigations in connection with college and other work 

 which required most of my time, but the long period covered 

 has been an advantage; for during these two decades there has 

 been such widespread interest in the Thelephoracece on the part 

 of American students of fungi that it has been possible to study 

 this family and its distribution from extensive series of freshly 

 collected specimens from all the important regions of North 

 America with the exception of Alaska, Mexico, and the Colorado- 

 New Mexico region of the United States, from which but 

 small collections have been received. These specimens have 

 been preserved unpoisoned in my herbarium in insect-proof 

 tin boxes which receive herbarium sheets, and each will be 

 cited by the number or other designation adopted by my cor- 

 respondents in order that their specimens may be as useful for 

 future reference as my own. The quantity of material always 

 awaiting examination has confined my work to a systematic 

 treatment of this family. 



Except in the case of types of species, specimens of published 

 exsiccati, and the specimens of Schweinitz's herbarium, I cite 

 but few specimens from the large herbaria. This is done on 

 account of the difficulty and large amount of time involved in 

 making a study of the material contained in them. Serious 

 changes in the condition of the specimens in these herbaria have 

 been occasioned partly by time but more largely by the poison- 

 ous solutions with which the specimens were soaked for preser- 

 vation under old-fashioned methods of herbarium procedure, — 



1 Issued July 1, 1914. (185) 



Ann. Mo. Bot. Gaed., Vol. 1, 1914 



